Performance simulation of an adaptive optics system with liquid crystal corrector under closed-loop and open-loop control

The adaptive optics system (AOS) often operates in a discrete sampling process with finite closed-loop frequency. Reconstruction, detection, and time lag induced errors are the main correction errors of the system. An AOS that is based on a liquid crystal (LC) benefits from the LC’s high correction precision, thus the reconstruction error can be ignored. The primary error will be induced by the time lag from the time of detection to the time of compensation. In this paper, some theoretical simulations are introduced in order to evaluate the correction precision of AOS with an LC corrector. The main purpose is to compare the correction precision between the open-loop and closed-loop control. We attempt to find a method to ascertain the exact precision of the open-loop control and show whether it improves the correction precision. The conclusion is thus reached that the actual error rejection bandwidth for the closed-loop was lower than the −3 dB error rejection bandwidth measured in practice. The increased refresh frequency of the open-loop control can improve the imaging performance to nearly −3 dB bandwidth of the detector measured, which is the maximum possible bandwidth due to the time lag.